Day 3175 - Labor Day

There wasn't a lot of labor taking place at our house today. It rained all day. Sometimes the best thing to do on a day like this is nothing at all. Dash did get his walks, thanks to the weather radar app on my phone. I don't know how I used to survive without weather radar. Even on wet, dreary days like this, there are usually opportunities to walk your dog. It's all a matter of timing.

Janet went to the gym, but I didn't feel like doing much of anything. I ended up watching a Strange Inheritance marathon for quite a while. It's fascinating how ordinary people often end up with extraordinary things. One of today's episodes was about a family who had a Rembrandt hanging on their dining room wall for decades and nobody knew what it was. When the parents died, the kids took a lot of their stuff to an auction house that specialized in estate auctions. Even the auctioneer didn't realize that he had an old master painting. Several weeks before the auction they put everything on their website where the painting attracted the attention of three European art dealers. The bidding started at $500 and quickly went to six figures. When the bidding was over, the lost Rembrandt sold for over a million dollars. It turned out to be genuine too. There were other episodes about a family who inherited a zoo and then there was the guy who inherited a huge collection of army tanks. There is nothing strange or valuable in my family tree. I'm pretty sure of that.

Dash got wet on one of today's walks, so we decided it was the perfect opportunity to give him a bath. Bathing a dog who can barely stand up is not an easy task. I think I got more water on me today than Dash did. Dash definitely needed a bath. He pees on his feet a lot these days. After we washed and dried him off, he definitely looked and smelled cleaner. Next on the list is to get his nails trimmed again. That's going to be a lot harder than a bath.

Today's heavy rains mean that the grass is going to start growing again. I was kind of hoping that I was done for the year. I should have known better. The weather is unpredictable here. It's not uncommon to still be mowing grass in December. I'm going to have to go up on the roof again too. I don't think I'll do this tomorrow. According to the forecast, it's supposed to keep raining.

If tomorrow is as wet as today, I'm going to have to come up with a plan. I'm not sure if I can tolerate doing absolutely nothing for two days in a row. It's a good thing that I have a high tolerance for lethargy, because I think this might be a very slow week.

We'll see what happens. I could wake up to sunshine tomorrow. I just hope that whenever I do wake up that I've been sleeping for a long time. Let's try for six hours. Waking up every two hours to take Dash outside is wearing me out.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2128

The vet said she thought Dash was walking better this week. I was thinking the same thing. He's not limping as much now and seems a little stronger with each passing day. It's clear that he does have a floating kneecap on his right rear leg. It's just not very clear how severe his luxating patella is. We did some tests and agreed to evaluate him again next week. Hopefully, Dash will continue to improve. If not, we can always make an appointment to see the orthopedic specialist. We'll do what needs to be done, but I'd like to avoid surgery if at all possible.

The watch winder company told me to return the defective winder in its original box, so I went to the storage warehouse to look for the box. I save a lot of boxes for precisely this reason. It took a while, but I eventually found the box and it still had the instructions and warranty card inside. I'll pack the thing up and take it to FedEx tomorrow. I'm hoping they'll just send me a new unit, instead of trying to repair the old one. Only one of the three winder motors is bad, but with my luck, one of the other motors will quit working as soon as they returned the repaired unit. I'm not sure how the watch winder company will handle this, but at least they were helpful and responsive. Some companies aren't.

I got my October invoices posted and in the mail today. It's a bit unsettling that my billings continue to decline, but I'm not going to lose any sleep over it. My business is slower because my client's businesses are slower. The whole economy sucks. Hopefully, things will pick up again before Christmas. Fall and Winter used to be one of my busiest times, but I don't have as many retail clients as I once did. One project a day is all I want. Any more and I'll be too busy. Any less and I'll start to go broke.

Someone will have to explain the Democratic debate to me. It didn't really seem like a debate at all. Every time someone said something, the rest of the candidates chimed in and essentially said "That's a good idea, but I'll do even more." Nobody criticized each other. It was just an odd love fest. Say what you will about the Republicans, but at least they dusted it up and got their hands dirty. Donald Trump was right. The debate was boring. I didn't learn anything new. That being said, Bernie Sanders was the most genuine. He may be an angry old man, but he's an honest angry old man. You can't say that about many of the others in either party.

There are no vet visits for either dog tomorrow. Actually, there's not much of anything scheduled for tomorrow. We'll see what happens.

Puppies are today's Dalmatians of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2072

Dot got scared going to the vet for her annual exam and immediately pooped in the lobby. This was actually convenient, since we needed a stool sample for the exam anyway. Her vet told me that other than having cancer and severe neurological problems, Dot was looking pretty good. Dot sees so many vets for so many different reasons that these annual exams really are just a formality. She didn't need a rabies shot this year, but did get a leptospirosis vaccination.  This disease has become a real problem in our area. It is spread by the urine of rats, raccoons, and possums, which all seem to wind up in our yard, so it's better to be safe than sorry. Since Dot has three different vets, I always need to make sure that everyone is on the same page. I usually spend a good portion of every exam telling the vet what all the other vets think. Today, we didn't even need to do the regular annual exam blood work, because Dot's oncologist at the cancer center has already taken care of this just a few weeks ago.

A box of Keurig coffee pods arrived in the mail this morning. "Don't you already have plenty of coffee pods," Janet asked me? Well, I guess I do. I don't really feel guilty about buying an excessive amount of Keurig pods though. Janet does the same thing with soup. It's hard to resist a good bargain. I'll find a place to store the new pods until I need them. They definitely will get used. I drink a lot of coffee.

I'm trying to remember if August was always this slow. Traditionally, the end of the Summer has always been slow for me, but this year absolutely nothing is going on. The odd thing is that even though I have no business to speak of, I'm still busy every day. It's amazing how quickly taking care of the dogs, tending to the yard, paying bills, and running the occasional errand can fill up a day. I had to run to the mall and pick up something this morning, but this quick trip and Dot's vet appointment were my only excursions today. It seemed like they took up the entire day.

I need to pick up a few books to read. I've been meaning to read Andy Wier's new novel The Martian and this would probably be a pretty good time. What else have I got to do? Dot likes having me nearby during the day and sitting next to her reading a book probably makes a lot more sense than getting up and down every five minutes to check social media on my computer. I wonder why I lost the desire to read? I used to read books voraciously. Of course, I used to do everything with a lot more gusto than I do now. I still make sure to take a new photograph every day for the blog, but a camera is no longer my constant companion. I don't play guitar all that much either. Maybe this is just the natural order of things as my interests change over time. Or maybe I'm catatonically depressed. I really don't know.

Everyone says it is going to rain tomorrow. I am so ambivalent about rain.We really need the rain. The yard is dry and the air is hot and dusty. On the other hand, Dot and Dash are terribly frightened of storms and make life difficult every time it rains. I never really trust the roof either. What this means is that I'll be really happy when the rain first starts, but will become increasingly irritated if it doesn't stop within thirty minutes. If the power goes out, all bets are off.

Lucy is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2065

It almost rained today. I could see rain clouds off in the distance. I even heard a little thunder at one point. It didn't rain though. Not a drop. Some parts of town got lucky. There were small storm cells all over the place late in the afternoon. I could see them on the radar, but they weren't headed our way. The rain only lasted a few minutes in the parts of town that did get wet, but that was enough to get people buzzing on Facebook. It has been a very dry Summer and any rain at all would be a major news story.

Dash's new meds are working. When I took him for his exam this morning, his blood pressure was almost back to normal. This was a big improvement from two weeks ago. I was kind of surprised to see the normal reading, since Dash barked and seemed agitated the entire way to the vet. He doesn't like to ride in the car. Maybe during those rare times when Dash is actually calm, his blood pressure will be even lower. Since Dash has always had a mild heart murmur, our vet wants us to start keeping track of his breathing rate when he is resting or asleep. If he takes twenty to thirty five breaths a minute, everything is fine. If we notice him consistantly breathing faster over time, we will need to bring him in for an echocardiogram and further testing.

I need to get my car safety inspected this week. People in Texas have always had two stickers on their windshield. One of the stickers was your vehicle registration and the other was the safety inspection. Now Texas has decreed that there will only be one sticker. But which one is it? Do I get a sticker for the inspection, or for the car registration? You still have to register your car and have it inspected, but you only get one sticker. This is one more case where the government has made something more complicated in order to simplify it. After making a few phone calls, I determined that the procedure is to get your car safety inspected first and then you present the piece of paper saying your car has passed inspection to the folks who register your car and they give you the sticker. Personally, I liked the old way better.

Dot didn't seem noticeably stronger today, but she was more active. She got up on her own and wobbled around the house unassisted half a dozen times today. I'm sure that some of what I saw today was just wishful thinking, but I'd like to believe that she is beginning to get stronger. We'll see if this continues. It's really hard to tell if Dot is getting stronger during this heat wave we're having because the heat really makes the dogs tired. The only time they go outside now is early in the morning and later in the evening. If it continues to get hotter, we're going to have to shorten Dot's morning walk. We got started well before sunrise this morning and it was still uncomfortably warm. We're doing the best we can, but for Dot's sake, we need some relief from this incessant heat.

Work has been so slow this Summer that life has been reduced to a single event per day. Tomorrow I go back to the dentist to get my teeth cleaned. Thursday Dot has her physical therapy day. And Friday I get my car inspected. In between, I'll decide what to have for breakfast. French toast and sausages sounds good tomorrow.

Hannah is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2032

Dot did well during her physical therapy session today. We talked about what was causing her to limp and came to no firm conclusions. The vet agreed that the limp could be caused by a wide variety of things, including an underlying neurological problem, too much exercise, or the Palladia pills she's taking. I'm going to ask Dot's oncologist if it would be OK to discontinue the pills for a month after her next ultrasound scan. If there are no adverse effects from postponing the chemotherapy for a while, at least we could determine if this was the cause of her lameness. For the time being, we will decrease the distance she walks slightly, while still having her climb small hills each morning to strengthen her leg muscles.

I finally finished editing all the images for my client's multi-media project. We've got enough pictures now for a nice slide show or a short Ken Burns style movie. If they want a slide show, I'm going to try to convince them to get one of those little Chromecast streaming sticks and just link it to pictures in a Google album. I've tried this and it's a super easy way to make a quick, professional looking slide show. When you select the Chromecast stick as the input source on your TV, the Google photo album you select will end up being the default screen saver. I used to spend days creating lobby presentations for clients and the first time I tried using Chromecast, I had a great looking presentation up and running in less than five minutes. I never thought it would happen, but I'm I'm finally willing to admit that I don't really need a DVD drive anymore. Netflix, Chromecast, Apple Music, and a host of other cloud based solutions are just so much better.

I traded my Apple Watch for the larger model. Why? Who knows. Truthfully, probably the only reason I exchanged the watch was because I could. I was perfectly happy with the smaller watch, but I like this slightly larger version too. Really, they're both pretty much the same. Hey, it gave me something to do after I brought Dot home this afternoon, it didn't cost very much to upgrade, and now I've got a bigger watch. I'll have to figure out something else to occupy my time tomorrow.

The reason it's been a slow week is that my writing assignments have dwindled to almost nothing. I finally discovered why today. The person who sends me most of the writing assignments is on jury duty. She must have gotten selected for a trial because she's been out of the office for quite a while. At any rate, when I resume cranking out articles, I'm be just as busy as I ever was. I actually ought to be grateful for the opportunity to take a breather. It's been nice not having much to do for a while.

This week has gone really quickly. I'm looking forward to going out for breakfast tomorrow. It will be nice to eat in peace without two barking dogs on either side of me. I created a monster when I started feeding Dot and Dash a banana while I ate my breakfast. Now, if the don't get their banana, they bark and howl until I peel and slice one up for them. Are these dogs spoiled? Of course they are. I've got to figure out another way to deal with this breakfast commotion though. Dot is gaining weight again. With her weak rear lags, we've got to be especially careful about her weight. She really doesn't need to be eating bananas and extra kibble after she's finished her regular breakfast. I've thought about solving the problem by just going out for breakfast every morning, but then I'd be the one gaining weight.

Greta is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2031

Have you ever noticed that when you see something sad on Facebook, it usually involves someone you know. When you see something happy, it is usually just a Meme that has already been re-posted thousands of times. Where do these Memes come from? They could come from outer space for all I know. I don't know anyone who ever started a Meme, yet they are everywhere. Lately, my feed has been filled with a combination of Memes and personal sadness. There seems to be an overwhelming number of dogs that have passed away or need a medical miracle to save them. People post poignant accounts of losing a job or dealing with illness, but only post cat videos and pictures of dogs misbehaving when things are going well. I don't get it. Maybe it's just me. I even find Throwback Thursday sad these days. My old co-workers post pictures of cool things they did thirty years ago. This probably just means that nothing very exciting is happening right now. So far, I have resisted the urge to share animal Memes or add my own ancient war stories to the Throwback Thursday clutter. I keep thinking that there is still something new and original to discover, but maybe I'm wrong.

Today was weird. The entire United Airlines fleet was grounded due to a computer glitch and a little while later, the New York Stock Exchange ground to a complete halt due to another computer problem. Nobody seemed to care. I think people would be more upset if Facebook was down for ten minutes than if the stock market quit working and planes weren't able to fly. We definitely live in very strange times.

Dot woke up feeling much better this morning, so we decided to let her take her regular morning walk. She did very well and I could tell she was enjoying herself, but unfortunately she started limping again shortly after we returned to the house. Maybe we did the wrong thing. I felt guilty as I watched her grow progressively weaker throughout the day, but she seem so strong this morning. It's hard to know what to do. With no exercise at all, Dot will become paralyzed again. With too much exercise she can easily injure herself. What I'm really worried about is that this setback might be caused by the Palladia pills. One of the side effects of taking Palladia can be lameness. I need to call Dot's oncologist tomorrow and see what she thinks. Lameness or having difficulty moving is a rare side effect and usually temporary, but it does happen. Everything we have done for Dot is to give her a better quality of life. If chemotherapy impairs her already limited ability to walk, it may not be worth it.

It looks like this entire week is going to be slow. I made some minor website updates this morning and got my July invoices out and in the mail this afternoon, but that was about it.  Tomorrow is Dot's physical therapy day, so she's going to stay home and rest while I walk Dash in the morning. There's no point in doing the therapy if she's already too tired. I hope that Dot's vet and her oncologist can reassure me tomorrow. She was doing so well. I really hate to see her starting to go downhill again.

Trevor is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1906

Dash got a rare chance to experience snow this morning. It was starting to sleet when we went to bed last night, but somehow it turned into five inches of snow by the time we woke up. This was a thick, wet snow that would have been perfect for making a snowman if I was so inclined. Dash was intrigued by the snow for a while, but quickly decided that it was too cold. Although all my Facebook friends seem to have uploaded a movie of their dogs racing around playing in the snow, Dash had other plans. He was more interested in going back to a warm, dry house for breakfast.

I was going to cancel my haircut appointment because the driveway and roads were icy, but the salon beat me to it. They called while I was eating breakfast and said that nobody showed up for work this morning. We rescheduled the haircut for tomorrow morning. This was a very strange snowfall. At 7 AM, the roads were treacherous. By 7 PM the snow was completely gone. By the time I gave Dash his evening walk, there was no more winter wonderland. There was just a lot of mud.

Work has been unusually slow this week. Maybe it's the weather. If my clients are like me, they're not really thinking about new projects right now. They're wondering if their car will start in the morning. They're wondering what to do with the kids if there's another snow day. They're wondering why the grocery store shelves are picked bare. Most of all, they're wondering when Spring is going to arrive. Spring is a little late this year.

I think Dot knows that she is queen of the house now. She has a comfortable dog bed in every room, with non-slip carpet runners connecting everything together. When she needs to get up, people come running to help her. Her vet even makes house calls now. Early this evening, Dot got another acupuncture treatment here at the house. Dot is funny. She always barks at her vet when she arrives, but as soon as the acupuncture session begins, she is quiet and relaxed. When the session is over, the barking starts all over again.

I'm looking forward to tomorrow. The weather is supposed to be warmer. Janet has time to watch Dot while I go to my breakfast restaurant and get a haircut. When we trade places in the afternoon, I'll work on my taxes while the dogs are sleeping. Whatever happens, Friday is bound to be better than this week of sleet and snow. Enough of this cold weather. I'm ready for Spring. Dot will be able to resume her water therapy in the Spring. I'll have wildflowers to photograph instead of sullen grey skies. With any luck, my friend and I will have some new business to work on. Spring will be good.

Rory is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1793

I need to get a life. I was so disappointed today when the HVAC guys canceled my service appointment. Yes, I was actually looking forward to getting a thermostat installed. I kept thinking that if they could land a spacecraft on a comet 300 million miles away today, it shouldn't be that hard to drive twenty miles to put my talking thermostat in. In fairness, it was a very cold day. The dispatcher told me they were only taking "call for heat" emergency appointments today. This happens every year. The first night it drops below freezing, thousands of people turn on their furnace for the first time and quite a few of them discover that it doesn't work. Having been one of those people in previous years, I could sympathize with the HVAC guys heavy work load today. I'll just wait until it gets a little warmer to get the thermostat put in.

I watched the live feed of the comet landing this morning and immediately wanted one of the cool looking chairs the flight controllers were sitting in at the European Space Agency Center in Germany. I did a Google search for the impressive looking chairs, but couldn't find anything. I bet the chairs are German. If Porsche made a chair, it would look like this. The mission itself was much more impressive than the chairs. The fact that we have the ability to land a spacecraft the size of a washing machine on a small 2 mile wide rock over 300 million miles away that happens to be traveling toward the sun at over 30,000 miles an hour is simply astonishing. Kudos to the team that put this astounding ten year journey together. Not only is the technology amazing, the math involved to ensure that the spacecraft arrived at the right place at the right time after its ten year journey just blows me away. I wish I was smart enough to figure something like this out. When I was young, I thought I wanted to be an astronomer myself. I wasn't very good at math though and picked a profession where no rocket science was involved.

Dash has a delicate stomach, so it's been hard finding the perfect food for him. Some brands of dog food make his poop runny. Others cause crystals to form in his urine or make him gain weight. We finally found the perfect diet and then the pet food stores stopped carrying it. Janet usually picks up food for the dogs, but since the HVAC guys canceled on me today, I had some extra time and decided to go look for the elusive brand myself. After an extensive search, I found nothing. The manufacturer still makes the food, but apparently Dash is the only dog in town that eats it. One store has promised to special order a thirty pound bag for us, but so far the order has never arrived. It's frustrating. We've got about three more days before Dash has to start eating Dot's food. That didn't work out too well the last time we tried it, so hopefully something will turn up soon.

Work has been kind of slow this week. Things always slow down as we approach Christmas. It's kind of a shame, because the colder it gets, the more sitting at a computer and writing seems like a good way to spend the day. I spent a little time updating websites today, but actually I spent more time looking for dog food. It was that kind of day.

Jada is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1353

I'm not a very observant person. Janet asked me this morning why I'd been washing my hair with conditioner all week. I wondered why the shampoo in the new bottle I bought last week was kind of hard to rinse off, but I never really questioned it. The bottle was the same color and shape as the last bottle of shampoo. I guess I never read the label when I threw it in the grocery cart. I wonder how long it would have been before I noticed the discrepancy myself. Sadly, I probably would have used the entire bottle without noticing that I wasn't really using shampoo on my hair at all.

I'd like to think I'm a keen observer of the world around me, but the truth be known, I'm generally oblivious to most things. Probably the main reason I take nice pictures it that I'm surrounded by beautiful things and eventually I notice them.

I'm starting to notice that some machines are a lot more popular than others at the gym. I wonder if this is because certain machines give you a better workout, or because they are just more pleasant to use. I tend not to use the popular machines because I don't like waiting for them to become free. It has occurred to me that my workouts might not be doing me any good at all. I really need to take some sort of orientation class and learn what these machines are actually designed to do. One thing that has surprised me is that I actually enjoy shooting baskets. I never enjoyed playing basketball, or even watching the game, but it is oddly rewarding to sink several baskets in a row.

When I stopped at the grocery store on the way home from the gym, I took a good look at the cars in the parking lot. Even if money were no object, I have a hard time getting excited by any of these cars. I might like the Honda Element if they made one twice as big. I might like a Ford Transit Van if you could get one with a big V-8 engine, fat sporty tires, and a luxury interior with a Sat-Nav system. Where are the newer versions of my Defender? Surely, somebody must make a short wheelbase truck with a big engine, two seats, and a large, completely flat space in back where I can put a full size dog crate. Extra points if the body is made of aluminum and the engine has a manual transmission.

This week went surprisingly fast, considering that not very much happened. Work has been unusually slow this August. If things don't pick up soon, it's going to look pretty bleak when I send out my September invoices. You can never predict the future though. In my line of work, things can go from dead quiet to totally stressful almost overnight.

Duke is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1092

For a while today, I thought it was Monday. That's the kind of day it was. I guess that yesterday was so uneventful it has already slipped from my memory.

It's was still unusually cold this morning. At least I remembered to turn the outside faucets on just a smidgen, so the lines wouldn't freeze. I'm always forgetting that the greenhouse has running water, since I never use the building anymore. There are probably other types of cold weather maintenance I've forgotten about as well, but it probably isn't worth worrying about. Sub-freezing weather seldom lasts long in Texas.

I got my December invoices posted today, but I didn't have time to take them to the post office. I did remember to make appointments with the hepatologist and the urologist. Most importantly, I remembered to take Dash to the vet. That's when I realized it was actually Tuesday. We're going to have to change his antigen dosage. After almost a year of no symptoms, his skin allergies are returning again.

I finished a couple of writing assignments today, but so far, it still looks like December is going to be slow. Actually, December is always slow for me. Things pick up quite a bit from January through March however. I sure wish someone would give me something exotic and exciting to work on. I'm tired of sitting behind this computer. There used to be travel assignments to break up the monotony, but those are rare these days. Sometimes when I'm doing press releases these days, clients just ask me to pretend I'm at the events I'm supposedly covering.

I wonder if the music store liked the repairs I made on the broken guitar amp? I noticed on the FedEx website that they received the package I returned today. I actually think I did a great job of putting the broken cabinet back together again. My woodworking skills are pretty good. From a distance of more than six inches, you'd never know the amp had been damaged at all. Although I'm delighted to have a brand new amp now with no damage whatsoever, I wonder if the music store ever realized how easy it would have been to convince me to keep the broken amp. All they would have had to do was sell me the broken amp at a special "damaged goods" price and they wouldn't have needed to send a replacement at all.

What a world we live in. I turned on the TV while I was eating diner tonight and within a span of three minutes I learned that there had just been a mass shooting at a shopping mall in Portland, the North Koreans had just launched a missile that could reach the United States, and huge crowds were still rioting in Egypt. I'm tired of all this chaos. When I retire, I'd think I'd like to live in a very small town, far away from anything exciting or dangerous. I'd still need to have broadband access, of course.

Emmitt is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1072

Wouldn't you know. Just when I had accepted the fact that November was going to be slow, the office fills with work again. Go figure. I am never really in control of these things and often feel like a twig tossed around in a strong current.

I didn't let the new assignments change my plans however. That wouldn't be right. When I went to the mall for my haircut today, I was surprised at how crowded the stores were. I think most of Dallas jumped the gun on Black Friday. It seemed like the entire town skipped work today and was out shopping. It still kind of baffles me why so many people do their Christmas shopping so early. I'm more of a Christmas Eve shopper myself. Although it took forever to find a parking place and I wish I had picked a different day, I did get a good haircut, so all is well.

I always stop by the Apple store after getting a haircut and I'll have to admit that I was more impressed with the new mini iPad than I thought I'd be. It's little enough to easily fit in a camera bag and still large enough to view pictures at a decent size. Even though I could think of four or five reasons why the little gizmo would be useful to me, I didn't buy one. I've bought way too much I don't need already.

While watching my Firefly DVD this week, I noticed that Vern Gillum had directed one of the episodes. The name sounded familiar. After scratching my head a bit, I remembered that I had worked with him several times back in my ad agency days. The guy used to shoot commercials. Although I remember visiting the offices of Vern Gillum and Friends in Los Angeles quite clearly, I can't remember the commercials we did together whatsoever. It's kind of sad. Slowly that whole era is slipping away. Last year I stumbled across my old print portfolio in the storage warehouse.  Flipping though the book and looking at page after page of ads from the 1980's, I kept thinking "Damn, that guy was good." It didn't even seem like my work though. I've grown so much more cautious in recent years.

I wonder if Dash thinks the same thing sometimes. Three or four years ago he won lots of ribbons at training class. Not anymore. Now, he just barks and acts irritated. Sometimes he won't even do basic things like sit and stay anymore. Can we make a comeback? I know we're both smart enough. It's just a matter of desire.

Ranger is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1071

I thought I'd seen everything. Apparently not. While walking the dogs this week, I encountered a man and his daughter walking two small donkeys on leashes like dogs. From a distance, I just assumed this pair were walking their Great Danes, but on closer inspection, the animals were definitely donkeys. They both had collars and leashes and were actually better behaved than my rambunctious Dalmatians. If only I could get Dot and Dash to heal as nicely as those two little donkeys.

I may have won the battle with the wasps on the side of my house, but I don't think I've won the war. When I went out to finish cleaning the cobwebs off the windows this morning, I noticed a lot of angry wasps buzzing around. Apparently when I knocked down the nests yesterday, some of the wasps were away doing other things. Now they have returned and don't seem to be happy that they can't find their home.

I knew it was going to be slow this week, but I didn't think it would be this dead. I added holiday hours to one website and deleted a departed employee from another. That was about it. I got a call that the webcams were down on one of the sites I manage, but it wasn't a problem I could fix. Personally, I think a rat chewed through one of the wires going to the router, but since the wires are buried away in the ceiling, there is no easy way to check. This is a job for someone a lot younger and more agile than me.

To avoid drifting around aimlessly like I did today, I made an appointment with Betty to get my hair cut tomorrow. The haircut itself only takes about 45 minutes, but the whole process of finding a parking place in the crowded mall and then taking a look at what's new in the Apple store when I'm done can eat up several hours. I've promised myself that I'm not going to buy one of those new little iPads. I don't even use the one I've got very much.

I'd certainly rather go to the mall tomorrow than on Friday. I don't really understand the fascination with Black Friday. Are the deals that good? Even my bank teller asked me yesterday if I was going to do any Black Friday shopping. Lots of people I know routinely go shopping on Black Friday, but I don't think they save all that much. Maybe it's just the thrill of the chase. I think I'll wait until the frenzy is over to do my holiday shopping. Shopping is much more enjoyable when you're the only person in the store.

Puppies are today's Dalmatians of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1044

When I was a kid, I used to watch The Twilight Zone every Friday evening. It was one of my favorite shows. At the time, the endings to those shows never failed to surprise me. Occasionally, they even scared me. I've started watching The Twilight Zone again on cable. What a difference a few decades makes. Now each episode seems like a simple morality play, where someone must come to terms with good and evil. These are surprisingly uplifting tales about angels, devils, fear and greed; all with a moral at the end. How could I have been scared by these little dramas? Many of the episodes could be used as Sunday School lessons. Times have certainly changed. Just think about what scares us today.

The other surprising thing about those old Twilight Zone episodes is how good the acting was. You'll see someone who looks a lot like a young Robert Redford, and when the credits roll at the end, it turns out that it actually was Robert Redford. Just last night, I watched an episode where the lead was played by a very young Carol Burnett. I've also seen William Shatner, Charles Bronson, Elizabeth Montgomery, and Burgess Meredith in Twilight Zone episodes. It says a lot about our society today that I've gotten hooked on The Twilight Zone again. It's not because the shows are bizarre or frighting, but because of the simple goodness they now represent.

Today was like watching paint dry. It didn't seem like anything happened all day. I did manage to complete one of my writing assignments, but I saved the others for later in the week. There's no sense in using up all my work in a single day. Things are so slow that I think I'll go to another video editing seminar tomorrow. In addition to chowing down on a plate of free brisket and coleslaw for lunch, I'll learn how to migrate my studio to a tapeless work flow. Actually, I haven't shot anything on video tape for several years, so I guess I'm really going to this event for the barbecue.

The dogs had a new exercise to learn at training class this evening. They had to run a gauntlet between two long rows of sitting dogs. Dot and Dash both did pretty well at this odd task, although I doubt that they'll have much use for this skill later in life. It's weird. Those old Twilight Zone shows seem completely normal to me now, but dog training class occasionally seems a bit like traveling through another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind. Your next stop...The Twilight Zone.

Ellis is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 931

For several days, I've been receiving e-mail from other bloggers warning me that Google Chrome browsers were restricting access to this blog, saying that it contained malware. What? There have never been any malicious widgets on the blog, and I hope there never will be. Since I usually use Firefox instead of Chrome, I wasn't even aware there was a problem until I received so many messages that I figured there must be something to the warning. I fired up Chrome to take a look, and sure enough, I was locked out as well. When I looked at the code for the blog, I discovered the words blogarama.com, which Google doesn't like. Like many bloggers, I used to display a button that linked to this site in hopes of getting more traffic. I removed the button over six months ago though, so I was still puzzled about why Google blocked me.

Well, it turns out that they blocked me just because I was lazy. Typically, I remove widgets, pictures and a wide assortment of other things from websites by just putting HTML comment tags around the material that I want to disappear. It only takes a few seconds to do this, and it's easy to reinstate the content if I change my mind later. I do this on my commercial websites all the time because my clients change their minds so often. Apparently, turning a link into a comment wasn't good enough for Google. They wanted everything scrubbed clean.  OK. You win. It was certainly easy enough to remove the comment too.

All this does leave me wondering about a society that is dead set on protecting everybody from themselves. Shouldn't we be able to decide for ourselves whether we want to visit a particular website? Shouldn't be be able to decide for ourselves whether to wear a bicycle helmet, smoke a cigarette, or drink a big gulp soda at a convenience store? It's all gotten pretty crazy. Most of the people riding bicycles in the park wear helmets, even though many of them are riding very slowly. On the other hand, I see people almost every day riding their Harleys down the freeway at 70 miles an hour with no helmet at all. Who is right? The Harley riders or the bicyclists? I'm probably on the side of the helmetless Harley riders, even though half of them will eventually get themselves killed. You really should be able to decide about motorcycle helmets, bacon, and websites on your own.

Today was even slower than yesterday. I think half of Texas is on vacation now. Other than searching for malicious code on my own blog and writing a little new code for for the website project I'm currently working on, I didn't get all that much accomplished today. I did make eggs and sausages for breakfast though, so it was a better day than yesterday.

Bob Hope is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 930

I didn't think much would be happening this week, and I was right. There were no phone calls today. With the exception of the usual spam, there were no e-mail messages either. It was a very quiet day. 

Days like this are dangerous, because I get bored and inevitably buy something online. Sure enough, about ten-thirty this morning I found myself wandering over to the Sweetwater site and looking at gear. I didn't want to spend much money. I just wanted to kill time. After wasting way too much time daydreaming, I ordered a nifty little interface that lets me use my iPad as a guitar amp.

With no deadlines to meet, I got started on my new website project. It turns out that the goal of distilling a complex site into something simple is a bit harder than I thought. There are literally hundreds and hundreds of pages on the existing site, and they all have been online forever. Since the old site does very well in Google search, I really hate to scrap it. I decided that I will just leave the old site on the server for Google to find while building a parallel new site on the same server. In the end, only the index page will be overwritten. This means I can never build a new page with the same name as one of the old pages. If there is a page called staff.html, the new page that replaces it has to be called employees.html, or something that won't overwrite the old page. Eventually, when all the newly designed pages get popular with the search engines, I can scrap the old pages. This all sounds like a good plan to me, but somewhere along the way, my client will probably throw me a curve ball that will render the whole strategy useless.

I'm such a predictable person. If you could see what I fixed for breakfast, you'd know how my entire day was going to go. When I eat cold cereal with a little fruit on top, I'd usually just rather go back to bed. If I fix eggs and sausages, it's going to be a productive but largely uninteresting day. If I fix French Toast, I probably woke up with a glimmer of an idea and may even appear to be inspired. Days when I eat out are the best of all, but this is only because it's Friday. If French Toast inspires me, you may ask why I just don't eat the stuff every day. I guess the short answer is that my favorite French Toast, sprinkled with powdered sugar and drenched in real maple syrup is the equivalent of a giant neon sign that says "Welcome Diabetes."

I fundamentally don't understand all the earnest looking cyclists who whiz by me every morning while I'm walking the dogs. I don't understand people who can't wait to get back to the gym. Yeah, I've heard all about endorphins and all that. I still prefer butter. Did you guess that I had cold cereal for breakfast this morning?

Bud is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day